Machine for lacing jacquard-cards.



' No. 690,6I5. Patented Jan. 7,' I902.

- V. BOYLE;

MACHINE FOR LACING JACQUABD CARDS.

(Application filed Sept. 15, 1897.) (No Model.) 3 Sheets$heet l.

THE "cams PFTERS 00., mm'ouma. wisummcl mc.

No. 690,615. Patented Ian. 7, 1902.. v. BOYLE.

MACHINE FUR LAGING JACHUABD'CARDS.

(Applicqtion med $9116.15, 1897.)

(No Model.) 3 Sheets$haet 2.

A 0 I, I I

N0. 690,6!5. Patanted Jan. 7, I902. V. BOYLE.

MACHINE FOR LAQING JACIIUABD CARDS.

(Application filed 5m. 15, 1897.)

3 Sheets-Sheet 3.

(No Model.)

YNE NORRIS Fgfins m. Paorum'na. WASHINGTON. D, c;

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

VERNON ROYLE,- OF PATERSON, NEWY JERSEY.

MACHINE FOR LACING JACQUARD-CARDS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent "N 0. 690,615, dated January 7, 1902.

Application filed September 15, 1897- Serial. No. 651,748. -(No model.) d

To wZZ whom, it may concern: Be it known that I,VERNON BOYLE, of Paterson, in the county of Passaic and State of New J ersey, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Machines for Lacing J acquard-Cards, of which the following is a specification.

My invention relates to an improvement in machines for lacing jacquard-cards, and more particularly to a machine of this character in which the cards are fed to the lacing mechanism by hand. 7

My invention contemplates a variable reciprocatory movement of the lacing-needle,

arranged to coactwith a variable feed of the cards to be laced to account for the longer stitch between the lacing-holes at the opposite edges of a card as well ,as for the shorter stitches between the. lacing-holes at the edges of two adjacent cards and the stitch intermediate of the edges of two cards without unduly drawing the thread.

My invention further contemplates a construction and arrangement'of shuttles which will permit free access to the shuttle from beneath the table.

My invention further contemplates handfeed mechanism which provides for the arrangement of the cards so that they may be readily grasped one at a time by the operator and conveyed accurately to the feed mechanism. v

A practical embodiment of my invention is represented in the accompanying drawings, in which- Figure 1 is a View of the machine in side elevation, showing the left-hand side of the machine as the operator stands when the machine is in use. Fig. 2 is a view in side elevation showing the right-hand side of the machine as the operator stands when the machine is in use. Fig. 3 is a top plan view, the ball or spool holder being removed. Fig. 4 is an enlarged view, in transverse section, along the plane of the line44 of Fig. 1. Fig.

5 is an enlarged view in detail, showing one of the shuttle-holders, its support, and operating-rod in side elevation; and Fig. 6 represents an arrangementfor supporting spools for supplying the needle instead of balls.

The frame of the machine is of general T shape in horizontal plan, the head A being cards when prepared for lacing.

supported by a pair of legs a and the backbone A being supported by a single leg a. The needles and their operating mechanism I are supported upon a pair of' brackets a a which extend upwardly and rearwardly from the head A of the main frame;

The main drive-shaft is denoted byeB and is'mounted in suitable bearings at the lower portion of the head of the machine, motion being transmitted thereto by a belt B, leading from a suitable source of power (not shown) to a drive-pulley b and idle pulley b on the shaft B.

The cards are fed step by step to the stitching mechanism by a pair of endless chains 0 0, provided with pegs 0, adapted to enter the peg-holes in the cards, a feature common to The chains 0 O are mounted upon sprocket-wheels 0, arranged in pairs at or near the opposite ends of the machine and actuated by a pawl 0 carried by a rocking arm 0 connected by a rod 0 with a vibrating lever c in position to be engaged by a cam-disk c", operated from the drive-shaft in a manner to be hereinafter more particularly explained. The vibrating lever c is operated in a direction opposite that in which its cam c operates it by a spring 0 fixed at one end to the lever and at the opposite end to the frame of the machine. The sprocket-Wheels c at the rear end of the machine are mounted in bearings supported by a pair of arms D D, pivoted to-brackets or, attached to the rear end of the backbone A and having their lower ends provided with adj usting-nuts (2, working on threaded stubs 61, extending through slots a of the brackets a, so that the tension o'f the feed-chains may be at all times adjusted and chains of different lengths employed to suit cards of varying widths.

Thecard-holder at the front of the machine is denoted by E. It is provided with a lip e at its front end, which lip forms an acute angle with the floor e of the holder, so that when the cards F are stacked on the holder ready to be fed to the feed-chains the upper edges f will project slightly one above another, as shown in Figs. 1 and 2, thereby enabling the operator to readily grasp with the thumb and forefinger a singlecard at its upper edge without any delay in separating it from the card adjacent thereto. From their position on the holder E the card is placed on the auxiliary feeder G, which rests normally with its face inclined toward the holder E and is provided with spring retaining-hooks g g, beneath the free ends of which the card is passed in applying it to the auxiliary feeder. The auxiliary feeder G is fixed on a rock-shaft g provided with a pinion 9 which engages a toothed sector 9 on a vibrating arm 9 which arm is connected by a link 9' with one arm of a bell-crank lever pivoted to the frame at g and operated by a cam g actuated by the driveshaft Bin a manner which will be hereinafter particularly described.

The motion of the auxiliary feeder is a reciprocating rocking motion sufficient to carry the card from the position which it occupies when placed thereon by the operator over onto the feed-chains C O, which convey it to the stitching mechanism.

The needles H are adapted to reciprocate the needle-bars h, having series of teeth 71. thereon arranged to gear with pinions 7L2, arranged at suitable intervals along a rockshaft 7?, supported in suitable hearings in brackets (0 supported by the brackets a a The shaft 71.3 is rocked to reciprocate the needle-bars, and hence the needles, by means of a pinion it, carried thereby and arranged to engage a toothed sector h on a swinging arm 7L6, connected by a rod 72. with one arm h of a bell-crank lever, the other arm of said bellcrank lever being arranged to engage a camgroove h in the side of a cam-wheel h operated from the drive-shaftin a manner which will be hereinafter described.

The shuttles are denoted by I. They are each mounted in a tilting holder K, supported by a rocking arm L, each of the arms L being fixed to rock with a shaft Z, supported in a bracket a depending from the frame A. One of the arms L, in the present instance the one carrying the middle shuttle, (see Figs. l and 5,) has an operating-rod Z, connected therewith above the rocking shaft Z, the opposite end of the rod Z being connected with an eccentric Z carried by the drive-shaftB. The rod Z thus serves to rock the three shuttlesupporting arms L in unison.

The shuttle'holder K is hinged at k to a base-piece 7t, hereinafter referred to as the shuttle-support and shuttle-holder support, the stem k of which is fixed to the rocking arm L in adjustment longitudinally of the arm, and the rear end of the holder is provided with an elongated slot 70, through which an adjusting-screw 70 extends to lock the holder to the base-piece orshuttle-holder sup port in the desired tilting adjustment.

The shuttle-holder K is provided with a finger 70 for holding the nose of the shuttle against the side wall of the raceway and with a lip k for holding the body of the shuttle at its rear end against the side Wall of the raceway and with a retaining-lip k at its rear end which acts in conjunction with the finger 70 to hold the shuttle against longitudinal displacement in the holder. The side wall M, in proximity to which the shuttle is intended to travel, holds the shuttle against displacement in that direction, and the top wall M of the raceway prevents the shuttle from displacement in that direction when the shuttleholder is tilted into its position to bring the shuttle into operative position in the raceway. The shuttle may be removed from beneath by simply tilting its holder K downwardly at the heel and then lifting the rear end of the shuttle out of engagement with the lip 76 The tilting adjustment of the holder on its support performs two functions, both of which are of very great importance in the art. In the first place, as has been stated above, the heel of the sh uttle-holder may be tilted downwardly, so that the shuttle itself may be removed from its holder without disturbing any other parts of the machine, and, secondly, this tilting adjustment coacts with the adjustment of the shuttle-holder support itself to place the shuttle in the exact position required with respect to the raceway, so as to make it work with the least possible friction and catch the loop positively. For example, after adjusting the shuttle-holder bodily by the adjustable connection of the shuttleholder support with the swinging arm the shuttle-holder may then be tilted more or less, either up or down, to bring the nose of the shuttle just where it is required to do its most effective service.

The particular construction of the shuttle I, by providing for disclosing the condition of the cop within the shuttle without opening the shuttle and for leading the cord from the cop through the end cap and into engagement with a tension device on the exterior of the end cap, forms the subject-matter of a divisional application, Serial No. 79,916, filed October 25, 1901.

The support for the balls or spools of cord which supply the needles consists of a pair of uprights N N, uprising from sockets n n on the brackets a a and surmounted by a crosshead 0, provided with laterally extended branches 0 0 0 the branches 0 0 extending in the same direction from the cross-head at or near its opposite ends and the branch 0 extending in the opposite direction from the cross-head at a point intermediate of the branches 0 0 The branches 0 0 o are provided with socket-pieces 0 for the reception of cups 0, in which balls P of cord may rest. The cord is led from the core of the ball down through the stem of the cup 0 and socketpiece o to guides on a curved arm 0 attached to the stem of the cup 0 or to the socket-piece, and thence leads to a tension device o on the needle-bar support, thence to a guide 0 onto the needle-bar support in proximity to the needle-bar, thence up and through an eye 0 at or near the upper end of the needle-bar, and thence downwardly through a guide 0 to the needle.

The above arrangement is such that the upward motion of the needle-bar It draws thecord from the ball P as distinguished from the drawing of the cord from its supply by the feed of the movement of the cards, as has heretofore been common. This is an important feature in connection with the lacing of jacquard-cards, particularly Where the cards are made of material which is more or less flimsy and where, as is often the case, difierent cards in the series will have different degrees of stiffness, thereby rendering the more limber or flimsy cards liable tobuckle under the strain of drawing the thread from the supply.

In order to adapt the machine to support a cord=supply when it comes from the market in the form of cops or spools, I provide the cross-head O centrally with a pair of depending branches Q Q, between which one of the spools P may be held by a spindle q, and provide the standards N N with vertically-ad justable collars q g, each provided with a spindle g for the reception of a spool P, which may be held thereon by any well-kn own or suitable means-such, for example, as a pin (1 inserted through the spindlewhere it projects beyond the end of the spool.

The cams c g and h are fixed upon a shaft R, which is supported in suitable bearings at the head of the machine in position parallel with the drive-shaft. The shaft R is provided on its end opposite that on which the cams are located with a spur-wheel 0", which is driven by a pinion r on the driveshaft B. In the present instance the relation of the pinion r to the spur-Wheel r is such that the spur-Wheel r, and hence the several cams carried by the shaft R, will rotate once for every three complete revolutions of the drive-shaft. As the shuttles are driven di rectly from the drive-shaft by an eccentric thereon, they will be caused to complete a reciprocating movement for each revolution of the drive-shaft,and as the needles are operated by the cam h on the shaftRin order to impart to them a reciprocating movement for each movement of the shuttle the cam h is provided with three radially-extended portions and three rentrant portions alternating with the extended portions, so thatin one revolution of the cam h the needle has imparted to it three vertically {reciprocating movements. By thus operating the needle through an independent operating mechanism Iam en-- between the two lace-holes at the opposite edges of a card. This is accomplished by making one of the three reentrant portions of the cam-wheel h extend (in the present instance the portion denoted by a:, Fig. 2)

nearer the center of thecam-wheel than the other rentrant portions. Thisextended upward stroke of the needle-bar anticipates the long step of feed which carries the carda distance equal to the distance between the laceholes upon its opposite edges and which long step of feed is provided for by the portion at of the cam 0 which permits the operatingarm of the lever c to approach nearer to the center of the cam 0 than the other rentrant portionsof the cam permit, and hence causes the feed-pawl c to engage the ratchet-disk a tooth in advance of that which it would ordinarily take, and hence increases thelength of feed at that step by the width of that tooth.

Provision is made for shifting the drive. belt from either side or' the front as follows The belt-shifter consists of apair of arms 8 s, projecting from a head S, arranged to slide on a spindle s and operated by a rocking arm 3 fixed on a rock-shaft .9 supported in suitable bearings at one side of the machine. The rock-shaft s is provided with handles 8 and s for rocking it when the operator is on the left-hand side of the machine, and a rod 3' extends from the shank of the handles across the machine and is-provided on the right-hand side of the machine with a handle 8 for the purpose of rocking the shaft 8 and hence shifting the belt when a person wishes to do so from that side of the machine.- There is also a sliding rod 8 located at the front of the machine beneath the supply-table E, which is connected with an arm 8 on the rock-shaft s and is provided with knee-plates s and .9 so that the operator may slide the rod .9 to the right or the left by the pressure of the knee against the one or the other of tho knee-plates, and hence shift the belt at his pleasure while sittingat the front of the machine and while his hands are otherwise occupied. V

The operation of the different parts of the machine has been set forth to a considerable extent in connectionwith the description of the several parts.

The operation as a whole may be briefly described as follows: The operator, located'at the front of the machine, lays the cards successively on the auxiliary feeder G, slipping them under the spring-clamps, and at the proper intervals the cards so placed are carried by the auxiliary feeder over' onto the feed-chains in position to receive the pegs on the chains into the peg-holes in the ends of the cards. The cards are thus fed along by the chains into position beneath the needles and are stitched together by three lines-of stitching, one line near each end and one at the middle. The upward stroke of the neodle draws thecord from the balls or cops, and as the needles return from the lacing, holes in the advance edge of a card the neodle makes its abnormal upward movement to draw off a quantity ofcord tocorrespond to the long step of feed, which carries the card into position to receive the needles into the lacing-holes at the opposite edge of the card. Then follow two shorter stitches, when the longer stroke of the needle and the longer step of feed again occur.

It is obvious that slight changes might be resorted to in the form and arrangement of the several parts Without departing from the spirit and scope of my invention. Hence I do not wish to limit myself strictly to the structure herein set forth; but

What I claim is 1. The combination with a needle and its operating mechanism, of a shuttle, a shuttleholder, a shuttle-holder support, means for operating the shuttle-holder and hence the shuttle, means for adjusting the shuttleholder bodily along its support and means for adjusting the shuttle-holder in diiferenttilted positions on its support to permit the removal of the shuttle, substantially as set forth.

2. The combination with a needle and its operating mechanism, of a shuttle, a shuttleholder, a base-piece carrying the shuttleholder, an arm to which the base-piece is secured, means for operating the said arm and hence the base-piece, shuttle-holder and shuttle, means for adjusting the base-piece with respect to the arm and means for tilting the shuttle-holder with respect to its base-piece, substantially as set forth.

3. The combination With a lacing mechanism and means for feeding the cards to the lacing mechanism,of a reciprocating and rocking auxiliary feeding device for conveying the cards from the hand of the operator to the feeding mechanism, substantially as set forth.

4. The combination with the lacing mechanism, the feed mechanism and the auxiliary feeding device, of a card-support for holding the cards to be fed to the auxiliary feeding device, the said card-support being provided with an abutment set at an acute angle to the floor of the support, substantially as set forth.

5. The combination with the drive-shaft, the shuttle and the shuttle-support operated directly from the drive-shaft, of the needle, a cam-shaft, means for driving the cam-shaft from the main drive-shaft at a reduced speed and a cam on the cam-shaft adapted to reciprocate the needle for each revolution of the drive-shaft, substantially as set forth.

VERNON BOYLE.

\Vitnesses:

FREDK. HAYNES, O. S. SUNDGREN. 

